If Not Chiropractic Care, Then What’s Your Alternative?

Informed Consent involves discussing the risks and benefits of the treatment you propose (in my case, chiropractic) AND reviewing the risks and benefits of the alternatives, which are “conservative” medical care, which typically involves prescribing muscle relaxers, NSAIDs (nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs), and less frequently, prescribing physical therapy.

Many patients who present to a chiropractor for the first time have already gone the medical route, with minimal or negative results.Today I would like to review the risks associated with the most commonly recommended pain relieving analgesics (NASIDs).

Do You Still Beat Your Wife?

There are certain accusations that are impossible to respond to, without sounding like a guilty party, trying to weasel out of a tight spot.

The accusation that chiropractic somehow “causes stroke” is one such unsupported and yet impossible-to-defend claim.

The simple truth is that there is absolutely no scientific evidence to demonstrate that chiropractic adjusting in the cervical region has ever “caused” a stroke.

Here’s a simple example of how flawed that logic is:

If I sneeze, and there is a traffic accident down the street, it may be convenient to claim that the sneeze “caused” the accident (especially if you stand to benefit financially from that claim), but where is the evidence?(more…)

A new court ruling has again called into question a widely used but controversial chiropractic treatment, concluding that a Newfoundland practitioner made a patient deaf in one ear and caused other debilitating injuries by performing a neck manipulation on him.

The judge in the civil suit found the chiropractor negligent and will decide later what compensation to award Abe Gallant, who says he had to leave his $80,000-a-year job because of the damage.

The decision follows a series of public inquiries and inquests that have blamed cervical manipulation for strokes, some of them fatal, and the filing of a $500-million class action suit in Alberta that targeted the allegedly dangerous chiropractic therapy. (more…)

In two previous articles, here and here, I talked about author Simon Singh’s battle with the British Chiropractic Association. The Guardian reported yesterday that the initial ruling has been overturned.
From The Guardian:

A science writer who is being sued for libel by the British Chiropractic Association is to fight on after a preliminary judgment against him was overturned on appeal today.

Simon Singh was sued by the BCA after he wrote an article in the Guardian criticising the association for supporting members who claim that chiropractic treatments – which involve manipulation of the spine – can treat children’s colic, sleeping and feeding problems, frequent ear infections, asthma and prolonged crying.

Singh described the treatments, for which he said there is not a lot of evidence, as “bogus” and criticised the BCA for “happily promoting” them.

In May, Mr Justice Eady in the high court ruled on the meaning of the words, saying they implied the association was being deliberately dishonest. Singh said that interpretation would make it difficult for him to defend himself at a full trial.

Singh was initially refused leave to appeal, but Eady’s interpretation was rejected by Lord Justice Laws, who said Eady had risked swinging the balance of rights too far in favour of the right to reputation and against the right to free expression. Laws described Eady’s judgment as “legally erroneous”.

Many scientists and science writers have rallied to Singh’s support, claiming that the freedom of scientific opinion is at stake.

Speaking after the judgment, Singh said this was the “best possible result”.

“Simon Singh’s battle in this libel case is not only a glaring example of how the law and its interpretation are stifling free expression, it shows how urgent the case for reform has become,” said Jo Glanville, editor of Index on Censorship.

Previously I wrote about the British Chiropractic Association suing science writer Simon Singh for libel. This has been widely criticized as a tactical mistake due both to the expense and to the negative publicity which has thus far ensued. The BCA has recently produced a list of evidence justifying the chiropractic treatment of children with asthma and colic which evidence-based blogs have proceeded to, for want of a better term, eviscerate. One of the criticisms was for the BCA not including a study which showed manipulation to be no better than placebo for infantile colic.(more…)

A study published April 2009 in the Archives of Neurology found that older patients taking aspirin appeared more likely to have barely-perceptible bouts of cerebral “microbleeding,” detected by researchers with the aid of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology.

The abstract and fulltextpaper can be read/downloaded at the link below: